Eternal

Q: How much has Eternal's share moved in a year?

Down 2.8% in a year, from ₹326.60 to ₹317.40. But it was not a quiet year. It fell to ₹215.68 on 13 March 2026, about a third below where it started. It then climbed to ₹342.65 on 23 September. It is now 7% below that high. Someone who bought at the March low is up 47%. Someone who bought a year ago is slightly down.

Question 1

What happened this quarter?

Accepted Answer

Sales grew 78% and profit 92% in Jul–Sep 2026. Like for like, the company puts revenue growth at 58%. The rest is Blinkit now counting the full price of the goods it sells. Sales: Jul–Sep 2025 ₹13,590 cr, Jul–Sep 2026 ₹24,138 cr, Change +78%. Profit: Jul–Sep 2025 ₹65 cr, Jul–Sep 2026 ₹125 cr, Change +92%. Margin: Jul–Sep 2025 1.8%, Jul–Sep 2026 3.1%, Change +1.4 pts. Both big businesses now make money, on the company's own measure. Food delivery earned ₹627 crore, and Blinkit ₹184 crore, against a loss of ₹156 crore a year ago. Little of it reaches shareholders yet. The company's ₹666 crore of adjusted profit becomes ₹125 crore after staff share awards, depreciation, interest and tax. And tax is rising, because Eternal has used up the past losses that used to cancel its tax bill. Blinkit added 308 stores this quarter, to 2,751, and now expects to pass 3,500 by March 2027. New stores weigh on margins in their early months, the company says, and it expects its older stores and cities to more than make up for it. Blinkit's order growth has slowed over three quarters, to about 79% on a year earlier. On the call, the finance head, Akshant Goyal, said it should pick up again from Oct–Dec 2026 as store openings speed up, and that the faster openings should not cost margin: "we don't expect that there should be a short-term margin reduction on account of accelerated store addition.".

Question 2

What does Eternal do?

Accepted Answer

Eternal is the company behind Zomato. It runs four businesses, and keeps starting new ones:. Blinkit delivers groceries, electronics and everyday goods in about 10 minutes, from 2,751 small stores nearby. Zomato delivers food from restaurants. Independent delivery partners carry 97% of its orders. District books restaurant tables and sells tickets for movies, concerts and sports. It is the ticketing partner for several IPL teams. Hyperpure supplies ingredients and kitchen equipment to about 85,000 restaurants. Blinkit is now the largest by far. But the profit is elsewhere: food delivery earned ₹627 crore in Jul–Sep 2026, more than three times Blinkit. Blinkit: Sales 19,152, Profit 184. Zomato: Sales 3,879, Profit 627. Hyperpure: Sales 1,154, Profit 10. District: Sales 304, Profit −64. New bets: Sales 132, Profit −91. These are the company's own figures. Sales include delivery fees, and profit is counted before staff share awards, depreciation and interest. Blinkit is moving well past groceries, and most of its new stores will open in smaller cities. There, the CEO, Albinder Dhindsa, said on the call, products "which are harder to find in these cities start selling a lot faster" than they do in metros, where people can buy them anywhere. The new bets show a company still building. Two are already selling: Bistro, and Nugget, which began as Zomato's own AI customer support and is now sold to other businesses. And the latest shareholder letter opens with dark.ai, a private AI assistant whose chats even Eternal cannot read, due to launch worldwide within 2026. The company is plain about how uncertain that is. "If it works, it will become really big; it's more like a zero-to-one bet at this point," Akshant Goyal said of dark.ai. "But if it doesn't work, it's something we'll kill.". Zomato pays the bills while Blinkit grows.

Question 3

How much has Eternal's share moved in a year?

Accepted Answer

Down 2.8% in a year, from ₹326.60 to ₹317.40. But it was not a quiet year.

It fell to ₹215.68 on 13 March 2026, about a third below where it started.
It then climbed to ₹342.65 on 23 September.
It is now 7% below that high.

Someone who bought at the March low is up 47%. Someone who bought a year ago is slightly down.

Low ₹215.68 · 13 Mar 2026High ₹363.15 · 6 Nov 2026

Daily closing prices, the last twelve months.

Question 4

Is Eternal debt free?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Eternal has no bank loans. The ₹5,757 crore that shows up as debt is rent it has agreed to pay on its stores and warehouses over the coming years. Accounting rules count long leases as debt, so this number rises with every store Blinkit opens. Against it, Eternal holds ₹16,475 crore of cash, much of it raised by selling shares. Management sees that cash as room to try new things, with a condition attached: "we have the balance sheet to invest, if required, into building these businesses, as long as they demonstrate a longer-term return on capital," Akshant Goyal said on the call. Debt is not a worry here.

Question 5

Are Eternal's sales and profit growing?

Accepted Answer

Sales grew fast: ₹54,364 crore in FY26, 27 times five years earlier. Food delivery orders alone more than doubled in four years, and Blinkit, bought in August 2022, has become the biggest business. Some of the jump is accounting, because Blinkit now counts the full price of the goods it sells. Profit has not kept up. Eternal lost money every year until FY23, earned ₹527 crore in FY25 and only ₹366 crore in FY26. The company says the fall came from depreciation on Blinkit's new stores, which nearly doubled in a year. Its own targets: US$1 billion of adjusted profit a year by FY29, and Blinkit's order value growing 60% a year for three years, which it says it is ahead of. On the call, an analyst asked whether a calmer competitive picture made the FY29 target easier. Akshant Goyal kept the target and would not go further: "It's very early on that three-year journey; we're still two quarters in, so I don't want to jump too much into the future.".

Question 6

Are Eternal's margins going up?

Accepted Answer

Thin, but improving. In FY26, Eternal kept about ₹2.20 from every ₹100 of sales before interest, tax and depreciation, down from ₹3.10 a year earlier. Part of the fall is accounting: Blinkit's sales now include the full price of its goods, so the same profit is a smaller share of a bigger number. The latest quarter shows the turn. The EBITDA margin was 3.1% in Jul–Sep 2026, against 1.8% a year ago. The company says food delivery has settled at 5–6% of order value, and it means to keep it there rather than push it higher. "Over the next 1 or 2 years, we expect the margins to remain flattish," Akshant Goyal said on the call. Anything above that goes back into winning and keeping customers, because the aim is more rupees of profit, not a bigger percentage: "That's what we're trying to solve for, not the percentage margin." He also said competition in food delivery rose last quarter, "partly also driven by Zomato" itself. Blinkit broke even only in Oct–Dec 2025, expects to reach the same range, and its mature cities are already above 5%.

Question 7

Is Eternal's ROCE good?

Accepted Answer

No. Eternal's ROCE is 2.5%: for every ₹100 invested in the business, it earns about ₹2.50. A bank deposit pays more. The reason is where the money sits. About ₹16,475 crore is cash waiting to be spent on Blinkit stores. Another ₹5,737 crore is goodwill, the premium Eternal paid when it bought Blinkit and the ticketing businesses. Management talks about every new store in these terms. "Eventually, the idea is to make sure that we see good ROCE on the investments we are making," Akshant Goyal said on the call. A new store costs about ₹2.5 crore on average, by the company's own figure. Each Blinkit store now sells about ₹9 lakh of goods a day, and the company says that could reach about ₹11 lakh once its stores settle. The older cities already pay their way: those bringing about 70% of Blinkit's orders are profitable on the company's adjusted measure, and its mature cities earn more than 5%. In the smaller cities where most new stores will open, he said, "Paybacks are extremely good.". The company's own target is a ROCE above 40% once the business matures, because delivery needs little money once the stores are built. That is a long way from 2.5%, and it depends on Blinkit's stores filling up.

Question 8

Is Eternal's profit coming in as cash?

Accepted Answer

Yes, so far. Over the last three years, Eternal booked ₹1,244 crore of profit and brought in ₹1,586 crore of cash: ₹1.27 for every ₹1 of profit. Food delivery helps, because customers pay when they order and restaurants are paid weekly. Until FY24, the business used cash rather than made it. FY22: Profit Loss ₹1,209 cr, Cash from operations −₹693 cr. FY23: Profit Loss ₹971 cr, Cash from operations −₹844 cr. FY24: Profit ₹351 cr, Cash from operations ₹646 cr. FY25: Profit ₹527 cr, Cash from operations ₹308 cr. FY26: Profit ₹366 cr, Cash from operations ₹632 cr. The stores and stock were paid for largely with money raised from shareholders, most recently ₹8,500 crore in November 2024. Blinkit is starting to change that. Now that it owns its goods, it has to carry stock, which went from ₹176 crore to ₹2,181 crore in a year. In Jul–Sep 2026, cash fell by ₹1,813 crore, mainly because Blinkit stocked up for the festive season, and the quarter ended just after a weekly payout to restaurants. The company says the big switch is done. About 90–95% of the products Blinkit stocks are now its own, and Akshant Goyal said on the call that "we don't expect any more incremental working capital change on that account". Some goods will sit longer, though, as Blinkit sells bigger things. "You can't keep just one week of inventory for air conditioners," Albinder Dhindsa said. Watch the cash Blinkit's stock ties up as it grows.

Question 9

Who runs Eternal?

Accepted Answer

Albinder Dhindsa, who founded Blinkit, has run all of Eternal as CEO since 1 February 2026. Deepinder Goyal, who co-founded Zomato in 2008, stepped down as CEO that day. He is now vice chairman with no executive role, still owns 4.40% of the company, and took no salary while he was CEO. The rest of the top team:. Kaushik Dutta, an independent director, chairs the board. Akshant Goyal is the finance head. Sanjeev Bikhchandani sits on the board for Info Edge, the largest shareholder. On the latest call, Akshant Goyal took most of the questions, with Albinder Dhindsa answering on what Blinkit sells and on AI shopping agents. Their stated rule for what to build is narrow: "We don't have the right to do everything." They named own-brand goods on Blinkit as one thing they have chosen not to do. One cost to know about: staff share awards cost ₹819 crore in FY26, more than twice the year's profit. It is how Eternal pays many of its people, and it is a real cost to shareholders.

Question 10

Are Eternal's promoters selling?

Accepted Answer

There is no one to sell. Eternal has no promoters: no family or group controls it. Funds and the public own it. Info Edge is the largest holder at 12.38%, unchanged for six quarters. Deepinder Goyal's stake rose from 3.83% to 4.40%. The employee share trust's fell from 5.91% to 4.53% as shares went to staff. With no controlling stake, there is nothing pledged either.

Question 11

Any red flags at Eternal?

Accepted Answer

One real dispute and one long-running probe. Neither is large enough to sink the company. Auditor: What we found Clean opinion, with one matter highlighted: GST. Tax: What we found GST orders of ₹420 crore, plus interest and penalties; being contested. Regulator: What we found Competition Commission investigation, open since FY22. Court cases: What we found Consumer and other cases of ₹20 crore. Group deals: What we found None that needed shareholder approval. The dispute is about GST on delivery charges between 2019 and 2022. The tax office says Eternal owes ₹420 crore. Eternal says it only collected those charges on behalf of its delivery partners. The demand is bigger than last year's profit of ₹366 crore, but it covers the past: since September 2025 the law has changed, and Eternal now pays this GST. Its cash can cover the bill if it loses.

Question 12

Who are Eternal's competitors?

Accepted Answer

Swiggy, in both of Eternal's big businesses. On the latest numbers, Eternal is ahead in both. Food delivery profit: Eternal ₹627 cr, Swiggy ₹341 cr. Quick commerce orders: Eternal ₹20,940 cr, Swiggy ₹6,594 cr. Quick commerce profit: Eternal ₹184 cr, Swiggy −₹895 cr. Dark stores: Eternal 2,751, Swiggy 1,240. Whole company profit: Eternal ₹666 cr, Swiggy −₹760 cr. Profit is each company's own measure, before staff share awards, depreciation and interest. Orders are counted after discounts. Food delivery is a two-player market: Zomato and Swiggy. Quick commerce is crowded. Swiggy Instamart, Zepto, Flipkart Minutes, Amazon Now and BB Now all compete with Blinkit. District competes with BookMyShow, and with Swiggy's Dineout. The past year was the hardest stretch, as quick commerce became, in Akshant Goyal's words on the call, "a 5 / 6 / 7 player market". He says that phase is behind Blinkit: "competition is more predictable now", which is why it is speeding up store openings again. On new players entering food delivery, his answer was short: "It doesn't make sense to us at all either and we are equally surprised.". Eternal says it will not buy customers with deep discounts, as they leave when the discount ends. Blinkit also sells no brand of its own: "private labels in quick commerce is not something that we think we have competence in," he said. Swiggy does both: it cut prices this quarter, and its own brand No!ce is in 1 in 8 Instamart orders. Eternal also says its new Blinkit stores clear its return targets even at today's level of competition.

Question 13

What are the risks for Eternal?

Accepted Answer

Both lists come from the company's own shareholder letter, annual report and earnings call. Food delivery growth back above 20%: Could go wrong ₹420 crore GST demand on past delivery charges. Blinkit's mature cities already earn over 5% margins: Could go wrong A crowded quick commerce race. District on track to break even: Could go wrong AI shopping agents, which the company says put District at medium-to-high risk. About 3,500 Blinkit stores by March 2027, up from 2,751: Could go wrong Profit still small: ₹125 crore on ₹24,138 crore of sales. Most of it comes down to one question: will Blinkit's newer stores earn like its older ones? In its mature cities, Blinkit already makes more than 5% of order value. On AI shopping agents, the company's view is that food ordering is browsing, not chores: over 65% of Zomato app opens are people deciding what to eat. On the call it added that "in India, agentic commerce adoption is close to zero", and Albinder Dhindsa said such traffic on its apps is "negligible". Zomato's own chat ordering points the same way: "people still want to browse and order," Akshant Goyal said. Eternal is also building AI of its own: Nugget already sells AI customer support to other businesses, and dark.ai, a private AI assistant, launches within 2026.

Question 14

Will the internet platform industry keep growing?

Accepted Answer

Yes, by Eternal's own numbers. Blinkit's monthly customers went from 2.08 crore to 3.70 crore in a year. It plans to grow from 2,751 stores to about 3,500 by March 2027 and 5,000 by March 2028, many in smaller cities, where new stores fill as fast as in metros. Being first there matters, the company says: "these markets are less competitive, and going in first does give one an advantage". Even its big cities have not filled up: Blinkit's monthly users there are already several times Zomato's, and "we don't see any plateau there yet.".

Question 15

Is Eternal share overvalued?

Accepted Answer

Yes, if you go by today's profit. At ₹317 on 23 October 2026, each share had earned only 51 paise over the last year. That gave a P/E of 621. Even that small profit mostly does not come from the business. Eternal is sitting on ₹16,475 crore of cash, much of it raised by selling shares, and in FY26 it earned ₹1,086 crore of interest on its cash. Its whole pre-tax profit that year was ₹615 crore. Without the interest, it would have made a loss. Most of the stores it plans are not open yet: 2,751 today, against about 5,000 planned by March 2028. So the price is not for what Eternal earns today. It is a bet on Blinkit growing, and on the company reaching its own target of US$1 billion of adjusted profit a year by FY29, which it kept on the latest call. There is also a smaller, riskier bet on its AI businesses. Any of them, "if they scale, is going to deliver a multibillion-dollar market cap outcome," Akshant Goyal said. In the same breath he called dark.ai a bet the company will shut down if it fails.

Question 16

Are FIIs and DIIs buying Eternal?

Accepted Answer

Over the past year, Indian funds bought and foreign funds sold. went from 39.04% of the company to 33.01%, and from 30.12% to 36.22%, most of that through .

The last quarter went the other way. Foreign funds rose from 29.08% to 33.01% while Indian funds trimmed. The number of shareholders also fell, from 22.7 lakh to 21.3 lakh.

Question 17

Does Eternal pay dividends?

Accepted Answer

No. Eternal has never paid a dividend, and did no in FY26.

It raises money instead. In November 2024 it sold new shares for ₹8,500 crore, ₹8,436 crore after costs, and an independent agency, ICRA, reports every quarter on how that money is spent. The share count has not changed since March 2025.

For now, owners get growth, not cash.

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AI Portfolio Challenge

What happened this quarter?

What does Eternal do?

Is Eternal debt free?

Is Eternal making money?

Are Eternal's sales and profit growing?

Are Eternal's margins going up?

Is Eternal's ROCE good?

Is Eternal's profit coming in as cash?

Is Eternal's management good?

Who runs Eternal?

Are Eternal's promoters selling?

Any red flags at Eternal?

Who are Eternal's competitors?

What are the risks for Eternal?

Will the internet platform industry keep growing?

Is Eternal share overvalued?

Are FIIs and DIIs buying Eternal?

Does Eternal pay dividends?

Jul–Sep 2026, ₹ crore	Sales	Profit
Blinkit	19,152	184
Zomato	3,879	627
Hyperpure	1,154	10
District	304	−64
New bets	132	−91

Jul–Sep 2026	Eternal	Swiggy
Food delivery profit	₹627 cr	₹341 cr
Quick commerce orders	₹20,940 cr	₹6,594 cr
Quick commerce profit	₹184 cr	−₹895 cr
Dark stores	2,751	1,240
Whole company profit	₹666 cr	−₹760 cr

Eternal

What happened this quarter?

What does Eternal do?

How much has Eternal's share moved in a year?

Is Eternal debt free?

Is Eternal making money?

Are Eternal's sales and profit growing?

Are Eternal's margins going up?

Is Eternal's ROCE good?

Is Eternal's profit coming in as cash?

Is Eternal's management good?

Who runs Eternal?

Are Eternal's promoters selling?

Any red flags at Eternal?

Who are Eternal's competitors?

What are the risks for Eternal?

Will the internet platform industry keep growing?

Is Eternal share overvalued?

Are FIIs and DIIs buying Eternal?

Does Eternal pay dividends?

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